The War Of The Giants | Processors | Part I

Starting from this week on, we are going to have a series on "The War Of The Giants". In these posts, we will pit the established tech giants from different arenas against one another. You shall decide the winner.

In part one of this special series, we pit the processor giants Mediatek, Qualcomm, Exynos (processors developed by Samsung) and Intel against one another.

Brief Overview

Mediatek

The Taiwanese company is known for it's multi core processors. Seen mostly in low range to mid range phones, the Mediatek processors are known for their capability to handle intensive & heavy tasks, along with their multi tasking strength.

Qualcomm

Who hasn't heard about the Snapdragon processors. Almost every flagship phone these days boasts of Qualcomm's Snapdragon processors. Known for their great battery life and graphics, Snapdragon processors are known to score highest in the benchmarks too.

Exynos

Developed by Samsung, the Exynos processors are known for performing the best when it comes to muti core operations. Samsung is well known for manufacturing processors for other manufactures which includes A4, A5, A5X processors for Apple devices. This highlights Samsung's proficiency in the processors arena.

Intel

The Intel Atom processors are based on the X86 architecture rather than on the ARM system. Intel processors have always been known for their high grade performance. That's why they are seen in most of the personal computers. The Atom processors bring in the same speed to the smartphone world too. However, Intel is way behind it's competitors in terms of number of devices which use it's processors. A lacking GPU and the absence of a modem in the built in chipset are one of the major reasons why Intel's processors are not used by most of the OEMs.

Battery Life

Samsung's Exynos and Qualcomm's Snapdragon takes the cake here. The Snapdragon processors are known to get the most juice out of the battry. On the other hand, the Mediatek processors are known to drain more battery than it's counterparts. However, Mediatek is now optimising it's processors to be more power efiicient.

Coming from the PCs, where processors consume about 40 Watts of power, to the smartphone world, where the processor should run on a power of less than 5 watts, Intel has taken great strides. With their M-core processors lineup scheduled to take the field later this year, Intel is bound to make an impact in this sector too.

GSMArena benchmarked the two variants of the Galaxy S7 Edge, one runs the Snapdragon 820 and the other runs the Exynos 8890 processor from Samsung itself. Here are the results of the benchmarks:

Exynos takes the lead in all the three fields: 3G talk time, web browsing and video playback. For a detailed comparison, you can take a look at the benchmark results here.

Heating Problems

All the processors are known to heat up when they are subjected to intensive tasks. Snapdragon processors are known to deliver the least heat. The other three, Mediatek, Exonys and Intel Atom set the temperatures higher when subjected to similar conditions. Qualcomm is a clear winner here.

Charging Speeds

We talked about both the battery life and heating problems. It would be unfair if we don't talk about the charging rates too.

Mediatek

Last year, Mediatek introduced it's fast charging mechanism PumpExpress. It was quick to follow it up with Pump Express Plus in the first quarter of this year. According to Mediatek, Pump Express Plus will help you in charging your phone from 0% to 75% in 30 minutes. Check out this grab from Mediatek's post about Pump Express Plus:

If you are curious to know about the differences between last year's Pump Express and this year's Pump Express plus, then check out the specs grab below:

In the last week of May, Mediatek announced the third generation of it's fast charging technology Pump Express. Pump Express 3.0 will allow you to charge your phone from 0% to 70% in a span of 20 minutes, which is 10 minutes faster than Pump Express Plus.

This new charging tech will make it's debut on the MediaTek Helio P20 platform that'll be available on late 2016 devices.

About three years after the introduction of QuickCharge 1.0, Qualcomm announced QuickCharge 3.0. The 3.0 version allows devices like the LG G5 to charge from 0% to 80% in a span of just 35 minutes. Have a look at the introductory video of QuickCharge 3.0 below:

https://youtu.be/v0Rhu2YGxeQ

QuickCharge 3.0 is currently supported on the phones having the Snapdragon 820, 620, 618, 617, and 430.

Exynos: Samsung has used the QuickCharge technology on it's Exynos processors too. The Galaxy S7 and the Galaxy S7 Edge have the Exynos 8 processor, which runs QuickCharge 2.0.

Performance

Single Core Operations:

Qualcomm and Samsung take the lead again. As you can see in the above graph, Apple A9 is a clear winner, followed by Snapdragon 820 and Samsung's Exynos 8890. Mediatek and Intel Atmos are cheaper processors for budget and mid range phones. Although, they may not have made it to the top 10, but they certainly deliver top notch performance even when single core operations are considered. (Note: Mediatek's Helio X20 is targeted for high end phones).

Overall CPU Performance

The CPU Overall Performance grades both the single core operations and multi tasking capabilities. Apple A9 is a winner here too. However, the Exynos 8890 jumps over the Snapdragon 820 to take the second position. The fact that both Qualcomm and Samsung's variants are there in the top ten, we get to know how much efficient these processors are. As mentioned earlier, Mediatek processors are well known for their multi tasking strengths, along with the Intel Atom processors.

Graphics

Qualcomm's Adreno GPU is the winner here. Qualcomm's processors have occupied four positions out of the top ten positions. The difference in scores of the first and the second position is quite large, which makes Qualcomm the undisputed winner in this sector. Exynos 8890 and 7420 variants are at third and fifth position respectively. The Exynos processors pack in the latest offerings from ARM's Mali range of GPUs. The Intel processors come in with the On-die GPU which is known for it's high quality graphics. Similar to Exynos, Mediatek processors also pack in different variants of Mali GPUs, which certifies the high quality graphics of Mediatek processors.

Overall Chipset Scores

These scores are a combined package of the graphics and processing capability of the processors. Have a look at the average scores below:

Here is a table summarising the features of Mediatek, Qualcomm and Intel's processors

Krittin Kalra is a 20 year old Android freak. Striving for passions, chasing down his dreams and living a life without regrets is his sole mantra. A bit moody, he also does custom ROM reviews for AndroGuider. Currently pursuing his B.Tech, he aspires to follow his heart.

The War Of The Giants | Processors | Part I
Reviewed by Krittin Kalra
on
6/24/2016 10:18:00 PM